rough puppy play

janey135 · 05-08-2011, 02:41 AM

hi just wondering if any one could give me some advice on how to stop my 15 week basset hound pup chasing / biting my other dog [ an 11 year old english springer spaniel } typical playing with him isnt a problem but he can get too rough and bite the back of my other dog's legs and ears causing him to yelk out. my other dog has snapped back once or twice but it hasnt made the slightest bit of difference i know he's a pup but im worried incase he really does do a serious injury to my other dog..

SophieB · 05-08-2011, 09:14 AM

Mikey will probably give you a thorough reply but I would say it's all part of a puppy growing up and it's what puppies do with their siblings and he is doing it with your Springer! I got two litter sisters together, just three years ago and they do this to each other quite often and it's easy to see that it's all part of them playing with each other.

Do you and members of your family play with your pup? It might help to lessen the 'rough play' with your Springer if you were to play with pup in the garden with balls or toys to fetch and carry and maybe if he gets a bit more tired out with playing, he'll not bother quite as much with your Springer.

I'll see if I can find a video clip of my Bassets showing them in a bit of 'rough' play!

Edit: Here's my girls at 10 weeks looking like they're playing rough... they don't really hurt each other though!

You Tube

Mikey T · 05-08-2011, 11:22 AM

read carefully the entire articles below and not just the selected quotes It is exactly as Sophia describes and you will find in another month or so the dynamic will be a bit different as the springer will be less tollerant but I highly recommend you let the springer do the disiplining and stay out of it unless blood is involved.

Puppy license and adult behavior–STOP SEPARATING PLAY.

Quote:

Humans are REALLY bad at reading what’s happening with dogs. We ignore really bad stuff and we stop, even punish, perfectly normal behavior. This is true even when you’re really experienced; I have spent thousands of hours studying this stuff and I am more convinced that I am an idiot when it comes to dog behavior than I was when I began. Maybe when I’m sixty I’ll start interfering, but right now I know perfectly well how dumb I am.
One of the reasons we screw up interactions has to do with the fact that, just like we humans do, dogs have communications that have beginnings, middles, and ends. The beginning is the series of behaviors that initiate the interaction, the middle is the interaction itself, and the end is when the dogs resolve or end the interaction and move back away from each other.
That entire cycle is VERY important. If it is not completed, the next time the dog or dogs tries to interact the “transaction” won’t go as smoothly. Some of the social lubrication will have been lost.
If interactions are routinely truncated, two bad things happen: First, the dogs involved don’t get to finish the conversation, so they get out of practice in how to finish interactions. This is a lot more dangerous than it sounds–every dog interaction is a finely honed and subtle meeting of two animals perfectly prepared to kill each other. Predator-to-predator transactions are not exactly natural, and dogs have evolved an incredibly complex series of behaviors to keep things from escalating into an attempt to physically harm. If they are bad at those behaviors–if instead of suave and smooth talkers they’ve become awkward and tend to say the wrong thing–they are in genuine danger of falling from normal transaction into a situation where one or the other of them will make a move toward a killing attempt.

...
New puppy arrives and is cute and wonderful. For a few days or weeks she toddles around and falls over adorably and snoozes everywhere and plays her funny little puppy games and everyone, including all the adult dogs in the house, smiles indulgently and allows her many liberties that they would never allow an adult dog.
This is normal and good; it’s how the pack bonds with and learns to protect the puppies that come into it.
But then at some point, say at twelve or sixteen weeks, even earlier for the quick maturers, the little soft fuzzy schnookums-wookums becomes a growing dog, and her little games start to involve using her teeth in a real and deliberate way. And instead of bumbling into the adult dogs’ heads and falling over, she’s lying in wait and then barreling over and jumping on their heads.
The adult dogs decide they’ve had enough, and they begin to punish her for this rude behavior. If she jumps on them they roar, they knock her with their mouths, they send her ki-yi-yi-ing into the next room. When she has play interactions with them they don’t hold back anymore; they pin her and knock her over and she yelps and rolls away.
The human says “Oh no! Poor Gladys! They’re being rough with her!” and they begin to supervise the play. Every time the adult dogs get “rough” they are stopped or disciplined. If they continue to “victimize” the puppy they are totally separated; she plays alone and they play alone.
THIS IS SUCH A BAD IDEA.
Puppies learn from adult dogs. A vital and absolutely incontrovertible role of a healthy adult dog is to teach the puppy how to be a good and polite dog. The adult teaches–yes, by physical punishment, though that punishment is not cruel–how to interact with other dogs, how to live in a pack, how to ask permission, how to back off, etc. If you stop that from happening, not only does the puppy grow up with SERIOUS issues that will hurt her chances of being a normal dog who can get along with other dogs, you build resentment between the two dogs. If the adult dog is never allowed to complete a lesson, he will try harder and sooner the next time. If he’s stopped again and again, pretty soon he will decide that the only way to deal with this is to remove the puppy from the picture entirely.

Puppy upto ~16-20 weeks are given large license by adult dogs to do basical anything. Timed with the rise of sex hormones, puperty that all changes and the adults can become quite harassing of puppies.

Social Hierarhies
[quote]It was apparent that adult dogs, bitches especially, showed leniency towards young pups in social situations. The termination of this 'puppy license' is cued by rising testosterone levels in male pups at four- to five-months of age, which reach a peak around 10 months (4-5 ng/ml) before declining to adult levels (1-2 ng/ml). When puppies approached adolescence, they were continually harassed by adult dogs. Male adolescents were especially targeted by adult males. This stressful phase of social development is mercifully short, because the pups quickly learn to display active and exaggerated appeasement in order to allay harassment by adults, i.e., the pups learn their station in life before they become serious competition on the social scene[/url]

The Puppy License and its loss

Quote:

Puppies up to 4 ½ to 5 months of age appear to have something called a ‘puppy license’ – something that allows them to be an absolute pest to older dogs without repercussion. You see puppies being down right rude in dog terms doing things like jumping on older dogs, stealing food and toys from adults, barking right in the face of an adult or worse still humping them – and the adults just seem to put up with it, and even expect it – at least well socialised dogs do (dogs with good dog communication and social skills).

However at about this age the license expires as the puppies hormone levels change and they develop psychologically. Adult dogs now start to insist on the puppy controlling their behaviour and being more respectful in their interactions – and this comes as a shock to many puppies who ignore the more subtle signs until an adult dog (maybe their best pal at home, a friend at the park or a total stranger) snaps back – figuratively and sometimes literally. The adult dogs might:

· Bark (roar) at an adolescent displaying inappropriate behaviour.

· Plant the adolescent’s face into the dirt with a well placed paw (something my boy was doing to other younger and over the top puppies at only 12 weeks of age – and which caused some distress until I figured out what was going on).

· Knock the adolescent with their muzzle or mouth.

· Snap at them.

The messages might be relatively peaceful and quick or they might appear and sound like a major scuffle if not full out fight – and the adolescent will generally be doing the majority of the screaming. But if there are no wounds then do not panic – now or the next time you see or meet this adult dog or any adult dog, or your adolescent will pick up this fear from you and act on it. This does not mean that you should put up with inappropriately socialised/skilled adult dogs or other adolescents bullying and picking on or terrifying your pup – so if you are concerned, if blood is drawn or punctures made then seek professional help.

Mikey T · 05-08-2011, 11:45 AM

Quote:

he can get too rough and bite the back of my other dog's legs and ears causing him to yelk out

IF you are not already doing so you want to work with the puppy similar to what the springer is doing to teach the puppy bite inhibintion and not simply not to bite. That is because there is and never will be a dog in the right situation that will not bite, you want to trin the dog when in that situation not to bite hard and cuse damage, There is only a limited opportunity to do this when the dog is still a puppy after the same `6-20 week period if the dog has not learned bite inhibition the oppurtunity to train it has passed

see Bite Inhibition =how to teach it

Quote:

Rather than "No bite," I strongly, strongly, strongly urge you to teach your puppy bite inhibition instead. Bite inhibition is a "soft mouth." It teaches the pup how to use his mouth gently. Does this mean that the pup will forever be mouthing you? No, not at all. Actually, regardless of the method used, puppies generally grow out of mouthing behavior after a few months.
So why should you teach bite inhibition? Because dogs have one defense: their teeth. Every dog can bite. If frightened enough or in pain or threatened, your dog *will* bite. That doesn't in any way make him a "bad" dog. It makes him a dog. It's your responsibility, therefore, to teach your dog that human skin is incredibly fragile. If you teach your dog bite inhibition that training will carry over even if he is later in a position where he feels forced to bite.
A story... Ian Dunbar tells a story of a bite incident he had to asses. A Golden Retriever therapy dog was leaving a nursing home and his tail was accidentally shut in a car door. The owner went to help, and the dog delivered four Level Four bites before she could react.
FYI, a standard scale has been developed to judge the severity of dog bites, based on damage inflicted. The scale is:
* Level One: Bark, lunge, no teeth on skin.
* Level Two: Teeth touched, no puncture.
* Level Three: 1-4 holes from a single bite. All holes less than half the length of a single canine tooth.
* Level Four: Single bite, deep puncture (up to one and a half times the depth of a single canine tooth), wound goes black within 24 hours.
* Level Five: Multiple bite attack or multiple attack incidents.
* Level Six: Missing large portions of flesh.
Technically, the woman received a Level Five bite from a long-time therapy dog. Dr. Dunbar wasn't the least bit surprised by the bites. I mean, the dog got his tail shut in a car door! Of course he bit! What shocked Dr. DUnbar was that a dog with no bite inhibition was being used as a therapy dog.
"But he's never bitten before." Of course not. And barring an accident like that, he probably never would have. But an accident is just that. An accident. Unpredicted. What if it had happened in the nursing home?

Teaching your puppy bite inhibition

Bite Soft

Quote:

Teaching Adult Dog Bite Inhibition
Teaching an adult dog to inhibit his bite is far more challenging than teaching a puppy. A dog easily reverts to a well-practiced, long-reinforced behavior in moments of high emotion, even if he’s learned to control his mouth pressure in calmer moments. I know this all too well. Our Cardigan Corgi, now six years old, came to us at the age of six months with a wicked hard mouth. Hand-feeding her treats was a painful experience, and I implemented a variation of the “Ouch” procedure. Because she was biting hard for the treat rather than puppy-biting my flesh, I simply said “Ouch,” closed my hand tightly around the treat, and waited for her mouth to soften, then fed her the treat. Hard mouth made the treat disappear (negative punishment); soft mouth made the treat happen (positive reinforcement).
She actually got the concept pretty quickly, and within a couple of weeks could thoughtfully and gently take even high value treats without eliciting an “Ouch.” She still can take treats gently to this day, except – when she’s stressed or excited; then she reverts to her previous hard-bite behavior. When that happens, I close the treat in my fist until she remembers to soften her mouth, at which time I open my hand and feed her the treat. So, while our bite inhibition work was useful for routine training and random daily treat delivery, if Lucy ever bites in a moment of stress, arousal, fear and/or anger, I have no illusions that she’s going to remember to inhibit her bite. Of course, I do my best to make sure that moment doesn’t happen…

bubbad · 05-08-2011, 04:51 PM

You go Mikey!!!

Mikey T · 05-08-2011, 05:46 PM

Quote:

You go Mikey!!!

i,ve gotten more than ny fair share of biter from rescue situations. THere is nothing more important you cn do to prolong the life of the dog thn teach it bite inhibition

Bite inhibition and more control to insure proper socializtion is why many if not most reputable breeds hang on to pups till 10-12 weeks of age. If your are going to taken on life long responcibility for the pup they don't want to leave it to chance with a new owner.

the more you know about rasing a puppy the scarier the prospect of doing so becomes.

Gracie's Mama · 05-08-2011, 08:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mikey T

the more you know about rasing a puppy the scarier the prospect of doing so becomes.

I know what you mean. The more I read on here the more scared I seem to get. I just really want to do a good job.

MollyMcFrecklesMom · 05-08-2011, 10:42 PM

All of what is being posted is good advice and it is very important to get your puppy off on the right path. We went through puppy kindergarten with Molly, but found that we were too obsessed with following the rules and it stressed us. Our attitudes were very drill sergeant-like and Molly was not responding to it very well. My mother pointed out that I was not enjoying her puppyhood. After that, I stepped back and continued teaching her manners and whatnot, but my attitude was different and she sensed it and became more responsive. Molly is an extremely sensitive soul, even raising my voice gets me the basset silent treatment. At 10 months, she is a very good dog and has a pretty good understanding of what is expected of her.

My point in all of this (and there is one) is that no matter what, make sure you enjoy your dog and their brief puppyhood. Discipline is very important, but just remember why you got the dog in the first place - to have a companion.

SophieB · 05-09-2011, 06:05 AM

MollyMcFrecklesMom, I think Bassets don't take kindly to people raising their voices, or shouting at them...
and they are possibly the most sensitive dogs as well as being the bestest dogs in the world!!!

MollyMcFrecklesMom · 05-09-2011, 08:04 AM

It's only happened twice and I certainly learned my lesson! Both times, she would go lay on the bottom step in the living room and look at me with the wrinkled brow and sad eyes. She's a master of making me feel guilty. No amount of apologies and head scratches makes it better. She forgives me when she is good and ready!

05-08-2011, 02:41 AM	#1 (permalink)
janey135 Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2011 Location: england Posts: 17	rough puppy play hi just wondering if any one could give me some advice on how to stop my 15 week basset hound pup chasing / biting my other dog [ an 11 year old english springer spaniel } typical playing with him isnt a problem but he can get too rough and bite the back of my other dog's legs and ears causing him to yelk out. my other dog has snapped back once or twice but it hasnt made the slightest bit of difference i know he's a pup but im worried incase he really does do a serious injury to my other dog..

05-08-2011, 04:51 PM	#5 (permalink)
bubbad Senior Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Boiling Springs,Pa Posts: 1,347	You go Mikey!!!

05-08-2011, 10:42 PM	#8 (permalink)
MollyMcFrecklesMom Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: Southeast PA Posts: 1,182	All of what is being posted is good advice and it is very important to get your puppy off on the right path. We went through puppy kindergarten with Molly, but found that we were too obsessed with following the rules and it stressed us. Our attitudes were very drill sergeant-like and Molly was not responding to it very well. My mother pointed out that I was not enjoying her puppyhood. After that, I stepped back and continued teaching her manners and whatnot, but my attitude was different and she sensed it and became more responsive. Molly is an extremely sensitive soul, even raising my voice gets me the basset silent treatment. At 10 months, she is a very good dog and has a pretty good understanding of what is expected of her. My point in all of this (and there is one) is that no matter what, make sure you enjoy your dog and their brief puppyhood. Discipline is very important, but just remember why you got the dog in the first place - to have a companion.

05-09-2011, 06:05 AM	#9 (permalink)
SophieB Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2008 Posts: 839	MollyMcFrecklesMom, I think Bassets don't take kindly to people raising their voices, or shouting at them... and they are possibly the most sensitive dogs as well as being the bestest dogs in the world!!!

05-09-2011, 08:04 AM	#10 (permalink)
MollyMcFrecklesMom Senior Member Join Date: Aug 2010 Location: Southeast PA Posts: 1,182	It's only happened twice and I certainly learned my lesson! Both times, she would go lay on the bottom step in the living room and look at me with the wrinkled brow and sad eyes. She's a master of making me feel guilty. No amount of apologies and head scratches makes it better. She forgives me when she is good and ready!

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